THE ERRATICS OF IRISHNESS: SCHIZOPHRENIA, RACISM, AND FINNEGANS WAKE

10.1163/9789004334380_008

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Chapter Summary

In contrast to the existing discussions in Joyce criticism dealing with references to schizophrenia in Finnegans Wake—arguments that focus on the central role of Lucia or Issy in motivating that depiction—this essay interrogates the persistent cultural stereotype that equates Irishness with mental illness and demonstrates Joyce’s refusal of that equation through a strategy of “schizophrenesis,” a writing style that forces the reader to inhabit a colonized world, fractured by modernization and institutional racism.